


High Drive

by lovebargain (coyotes)



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Collars, Hand Jobs, Leashes, Light Petting, M/M, Meditation, Praise Kink, Subspace
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-22
Updated: 2020-08-22
Packaged: 2021-03-06 20:15:38
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,575
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26034778
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coyotes/pseuds/lovebargain
Summary: “What—“Elias stops him. Not with words, but something he cansee.He winds the leash around his hand once. A few inches less give. There’s still plenty more, a long arch over the side of his chair.“I’ll explain the rules once. As usual, I'll assume you won’t need them a second time.”
Relationships: Elias Bouchard/Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist
Comments: 6
Kudos: 100
Collections: Rusty Kink





	High Drive

**Author's Note:**

> Tried to add some much-needed pet play to this fandom but then totally failed because Elias just really loves to monologue, I guess! Some typey game dog, you are, Jon. 
> 
> Based off this prompt; https://rusty-kink.dreamwidth.org/1380.html?thread=533092#cmt533092 <3

“Ah.” Elias tuts. “Leave it, Jon.” 

The pads of Jon’s fingers, just barely starting to map the thick leather down to the buckle, drop several inches at the tone. It isn’t cruel, not quite, but it’s stern enough for the association now hardwired into his Archivist’s brain to listen based on reflex alone. 

That development seems to confuse him. If the way his expression tightens - thick brows drawing towards the center, eyes cast down with thought, fingers feeling over one another for phantom sensation - is any indication. Additional factors outside of his control are not unusual for these meetings, but there’s a certain _charm_ to his predictable surprise at every single one. 

When one desires to comb through the negatives clouding up the flecks of gold buried within a churning pool, when one sees fit to _look,_ one gets very good at finding them. For example, as Jon explores his own cocktail of burdensome emotions with a leather loop around his neck, Elias takes note that his Archivist couldn’t find it in him to complain that his Keeper had addressed him by name. 

He so often wishes to forget himself. A good thing, really, his budding desire to lose that tether in the expanse of knowledge his soul aches to join. But, Elias will admit to one selfish thought, this makes the startled moments where he struggles to see beyond himself all the more satisfying to break. 

This is his project. His purpose. 

Elias Bouchard is building an Archive.

To create the place of worship, one must cultivate the vessel to store more than just the blueprints between his ribs until his insides embody the space meant to fill a blank world up anew. One must make room inside him. Not by tearing or shredding or cutting, no, no, never, but with nudges and scratches and praise. 

That _is_ the secret, after all. To understand the greatest fear, one must experience the greatest love. One Elias has bound himself to provide. 

My, my, he’s getting ahead of himself. 

“Palms down.” 

Jon’s hands hesitate, but after the initial mental hiccup his palms flatten against the carpet. Twin anchors to the shell of his Panopticon. He frowns. Such a severe thing when aimed at his own actions. Made less severe by the gorgeous press of brown leather against his neck, seams lined with gold thread. 

“You’re showing _remarkable_ self-control today. What a coincidence.” Elias gestures as he speaks with the hand he loosely holds the leash’s handle in. It sends a vibration down to the clip, soft sounds of metal against metal. “I think you’ll rather enjoy this one.”

 _This one_ being their next arranged exercise. 

There are statement meetings, of course. Simple facts displayed over simple truths, subjective reality paving way for objective fear in the Archivist’s hands. Another easy catalogue, another small file to join the others. That is the problem with statements, though. Unless he wants to build an Archive full of filing cabinets, they are simple appetizers. Useful to gauge checkpoints in his development, but only the tip of the iceberg. Ah, he’s blending metaphors. Back to the task at hand. 

_These_ ones, these leave his Archivist wanting. They leave his mind split open. Oozing, cracked eggshell exposure leaking the contents into Elias Bouchard’s waiting palms. 

That imagery comes from Jon’s mind, not his. Important to keep track for now. 

Elias seems to want a response, and he can be patient. He can sit with his knees cradling the empty space on either side of Jon’s head, keeping him safe. He can gaze down, unblinking in the cosmic sense of things, until Jon starts gathering his tics. The antsy motions of his shoulders acclimating to the space beneath Elias’ desk. The familiar twitch at the corner of his right eye as he fails to break their contact. 

It’s the swallow that breaks him. His Adam’s apple bobs against the material leather, and Jon opens his mouth. 

“What—“

Elias stops him. Not with words, but something he can _see_. He winds the leash around his hand once. A few inches less give. There’s still plenty more, a long arch over the side of his chair. 

“I’ll explain the rules once. As usual, I’ll assume you won’t need them a second time.” Elias smiles down at him. “You’re going to find something for me, Jon. You’ll look until one of two things happen: the first, and this is _really_ the best option for you, you tell me what you see.”

Jon stops him. His bark, as usual, is worse than his bite. And his bark is barely a whisper. “Your tie doesn’t match your suit, Elias. I don’t know how you can expect me to focus when your sense of fashion app—“

Elias winds the leash around his hand once more. Somehow, it hits like a threat. The metal clip jingles again. “The second, _Jon,_ is that you fail. Our session ends there, and you shut the door behind you. Now, what’ll it be?”

This is one of the harsher stings. Jon agreed to this. To all of it. To come here of his own accord, to seek guidance, to receive it. Curiosity, as they say. He doesn’t like to admit he chooses to be here, chooses the same path every time, though they both know. It’s a pointless little hang up, but one they have to push through on the path to obedience nonetheless. 

Jon grates out his answer. “What do I do?”

His reward is immediate. Elias splays the fingers of his free hand in Jon’s hair and pushes away the rogue strands that might obscure his vision. _“Good._ I want you to focus on the static, Jon. Follow it. Not in this room—“ 

The soft hum of a stray tape recorder continues from an open space on the bookshelf. Middle shelf, to be specific. Nestled between two novels. Jon knows this. He always knows this. 

“—but in the others. Your job today isn’t to think. It’s to follow a trail. One I know you can see just fine, you’ve made _so_ much progress.”

The praise lands thick inside his chest. Jon exhales, and does not mention he doesn’t know how. Today, a weight holds him steady by the neck, one that connects him to Elias. Today, enough of him wants to try. 

Elias makes it easy, at first. The hand stays in his hair, idle touches never tipping over into distraction. A pleasant buzz begins to build at the back of Jon’s skull, one he wishes he wanted to shy away from. Instead, he leans against Elias’ hand. 

That buzz begins to encompass his body entirely, sickly feverish and good all at once. A part of his mind starts to search, to open, to _track_ something he is incapable of comprehending while still attached to his own body. It starts with the tape recorder already in the room, soft whispers of visual sensation melting into the auditory. 

From the outside, Jon’s eyes go pleasantly hazy. Pupils dilating in and out as though adjusting to a frequently changing source of light, trying to leave this realm of understanding without looking so far ahead he can’t tip back the other way and out. But, ah, he can’t logic his way through this one. 

His senses have him crawling across the floor, an out-of-body ball of awareness just barely stretching into life from the other end of the desk that he can’t see with his actual _body._ It isn’t painful, in fact it feels like dunking himself into a warm pool, and Jon eases just the slightest more into it when he recognizes the perspective. The familiarity of a door that is not open but see-through, translucent almost, as he approaches. Someone walks by. 

No, that’s not right. Someone is _going_ to walk by, rather soon. 

Jon ignores the pride sparking in his gut. Something rattles behind him, or-- technically, in front of him physically, but he isn’t focused on that. Instead, he allows his awareness to slip beneath the door. From there are other doors along a hallway he knows _intimately._ Uninteresting doors that contain nothing that he wants, at least not right now. 

Ah. So he has a direction. He arbitrarily turns right, or, well- he knows if he continues to the left, all he’ll find are the lifts. He wants the stairs. Why does he want the stairs? 

Jon comes to just as Elias winds the leash around his hand one more time. It seems he’s done it enough that the collar pulls tight against the back of his neck. Jon’s breath hitches. 

Elias doesn’t find it relevant to tell him he hadn’t been breathing, while he searched. 

“Oh, did I not say I’d make it more challenging if you came back out? You want it. _Fetch.”_

Jon is beyond argument. His fingers dig into the flesh just above Elias’ knees, his only point of balance where he’s forced to lean forward. He always takes so beautifully to the dehumanization, the sort that gives him a purpose. One that implicates something special without any of the control. Jon sucks in a breath and repeats the process anew. Starts completely over.

Rewinds.

There is a second tape recorder tucked into a high spot on the stairwell, hidden carefully above an exposed pipe system. He understands the game the moment he finds it, continuing down the stairs at a slow, unpracticed crawl. Some of it draws from pure memory, but the-- the tapes, some sort of frequency allows him a certain radius of understanding. It’s a live feed. 

_Oh._

Who is that? Two employees, sharing a cigarette in the stairwell. One of them is crying. The smoke detector in this particular hallway shorted out months ago, and the employees have mapped this one. Jon stays fixated on this moment, desperate to glean the details he Sees there. Details the tape spoon feeds him gladly. 

The next time he comes back out, ashamed and afraid of his own reach at a half-whispered conversation he lingered far too long observing, his breath is tight in his chest. Elias has used the leash to pull him taut by several more loops he hadn’t even _felt,_ leaving far less slack than he started with. Jon strains to stay on his knees. 

“Good. You’re doing so _well,_ Archivist.” 

He makes it down to Artefact storage before the strain against his neck grows so intense he has no choice but to relinquish control of his body. All in exchange for his pursuit of knowledge. He lifts his hands to brace over Elias’ knees, most of his weight settling unevenly there. He’s eager to get back to it, so he only spares Elias a fiery look that is most certainly _pleading_ before attempting to go back.

Elias immediately shortens the leash. The Archivist chokes, leaning further forward. Elias has backed his chair away from the desk, and how he did _that_ without Jon noticing is beyond him, but what matters is-- What matters is his own dress shirt has come loose from his pants with all the upward movement. Where it draws away from his skin with gravity’s help, it leaves him exposed. 

The Archivist ignores that, falling mentally back into the static that he wants nothing more than to be a part of. 

_Elias--_

Elias scratches lightly up from his waistband to a spot just above his navel with all four fingers. The Archivist whimpers. Elias reverses, going back down. 

He starts to _shake._ His elbows strain where he fights to hold up his weight. But he knows what he’s after now, he can feel it deep within his own blood that pumps hot and all-consuming each time his breath is returned to him. The Archivist dives in, awareness scratching at the oldest floorboards of the Institute in search of an object, something he can fit in both hands, covered in dust--

Elias holds the leash tightly in his grip with Jon pulled taut, petting lightly over his sensitive underbelly in ways that, once he can force awareness on himself, Jon is horrified to realize make him want to _roll over._

Instead, ever the crowned prince of mixed signals, he growls low and deep in his throat. A noise that would surprise him if he were aware of a single thing but what he finds stopping him from what he needs. It’s quickly cut off by a swift tug on the leash, until he’s a short few inches from Elias’ face. 

“You’re running out of slack, Archivist. Go on.” 

Jon’s elbows struggle to hold up his weight and ignore whatever Elias is _doing_ to him, fingers warm and tingling with the same static that bubbles up and around his brain even when he’s drawn back out. Some part of him is stuck several floors below, deep, deep within the proverbial catacombs of their unreleased collections. 

“Oh, God,” He whines under his breath as Elias finds a spot near his side, at the dip beneath his hip, that makes him involuntarily shiver. Whines again, pitiful and broken, when Elias _notices_ and keeps scratching there. This isn’t a fair game. He doesn’t want to _lose._ How could he not? How could he possibly—

Jon hears his zipper coming undone beneath him, and he propels himself back into his vision. 

There. 

Basement storage. 

Row sixteen, ten steps down. On the right. Top shelf. Hardcover with the spine in tatters, the binding falling apart over the pages. Old. A century, at least. One and a half, actually, 1866 original publication. October twelfth. It passed through four owners before donation. There is nothing remarkable about it except that—

Elias had undone his pants for the sole purpose of better reaching the sensitive skin below Jon’s stomach. He seems content to ghost his fingers there, to ignore the way his Archivist twitches into and away from the contact. “Except what, Archivist?”

Jon’s teeth chatter with overstimulation. 

_Except that it was written by a man named Jonathan Simms, with two ‘m’s._

Nails become a palm pressed flat and soothing against his stomach, warmth against overheated warmth. He paints the picture of every over- to exist; he’s covered overstimulation and overheated already, but the flurry of feeling includes overworked, overfull, overtired, overexcited, over, over, over, roll over.

Finally, Jon’s mouth and head are simultaneously quiet. 

_“Good boy,”_ Elias says, words washing over his Archivist’s spine. His knees buckle, and he’s grateful for it, all of it, and-- and--

And what’s left of him here, in this space, is happy. 

Jon is quite an unhappy person, even at the best of times. The evidence is obvious in the delightful rarity of the Archivist’s relaxed features showing off the permanent array of worry lines across his face. Elias softens them further with a thumb against Jon’s chin. 

It’s all semantics, really; dog is archivist is Archivist is Archive, one unto the other. Inquisitive nails clicking on tile and happy to do what is told of it. Fetch knowledge, bury it as necessary, keep it safe, keep it whole, protect it carefully, bring it home. 

For now, the dogged devotion to the Eye through Elias will suffice. 

Elias hooks a hand along the underside of one of Jon’s knees; he folds easily. He wants to, and that makes all the difference. Pliant and sated by the Eye to be rewarded. It’s easy enough to maneuver the chair closer again, so Jon’s back presses hard against the desk and his knees bend on either side of Elias’ lap, tilted wide and inviting. 

“Good boy,” Elias repeats, and there’s that new shiver again. The one that takes Jon another step down into empty-headed bliss, waiting to be filled up by adoration for their patron’s knowledge. “Elbows up.” 

His elbows find the table. To make it work he has to stretch slightly back, the action pushing his shirt up to reveal more of his stomach. The shiver turns into one of anticipation while he pants, eyes blissfully unfocused. It was such a simple task, really, but he can’t fight that he _wants_ a reward, doesn’t want to fight that he wants it. This is something new entirely. 

Elias starts to undo the loops he’d made around his own hand. Slow, circular motions that Jon finds hypnotizing, is still struggling to follow. 

“Open.” The Archivist complies. Elias taps the underside of his jaw, prompting him to clench his teeth around the leather. It’s a comfortable weight in his mouth, something he’s in charge of. Such a tiny, tiny thing, but it helps. To feel like the leash is _his._ How easily he’s led. 

Elias scratches his nails along the side of his jaw, lighter still over his chin. Jon lifts his head into the touch and is subsequently rewarded with deeper contact, Elias’ free hand sliding up and down his chest to his navel. Up, down. Up, down. After a few repetitive motions, Jon’s breathing starts to sync up with each revolution. 

After a minute of basking in the tiny sounds drawn out from his Archivist, Elias’ other hand leaves where he’s been petting his neck to join the other at his lower stomach. To map the muscles beneath his skin, feel the way they jump at every touch. 

It is very entertaining, Elias finds, to slide his fingers down just short of where the button is undone at his pants, to watch the subtle upward tilt of Jon’s hips try to keep itself hidden. Elias doesn’t let him. He handily unbuttons the rest of Jon’s shirt to let it hang uselessly at either side of him, and rests his hands just above his ribs on either side. 

Jon’s breath hitches, sensing what’s to come without truly being able to _know,_ and then Elias’ deft fingers are scratching down his sides. His hips _jump._

“Patience.” 

He doesn’t have to be patient for much longer, because after a few minutes of winding him up, discovering all the sweet spots that have him arching for more with no shame left inside him, Elias turns a downward scratch into a dip beneath the waistband to cup his erection through his briefs. Adorable, really, how ready he is for this, how little he can hide it from here. How much access he’s happily provided for Elias, how much he’s fed him just by showing him every little weak point he has. 

His eyes must have been shut when Elias slicked up his hand, but _oh,_ it’s perfect as he reaches to pull him out of the confines of the fabric with little fanfare. 

Stuck where he is, Jon makes an undignified whimper as he tilts to follow Elias’ fingers. His thighs squeeze on either side of him, hips adorably barely-controlled with how they try to push up into his hand and try to stay still at once. 

Elias rubs at the underside of the head with his thumb, offering a smug ‘mm?’ when Jon’s mouth falls open around a silent moan of pleasure. The leash falls to his stomach, which Elias simply moves out of the way. No use punishing him for that, not right now. 

“You’ve been _very_ good for me today,” He near-whispers, playing it up. Jon would growl at him again if he didn’t feel so good. “If you were this well-behaved for all of our exercises, we’d be making much more progress, wouldn’t we?” 

_“Are_ we going to be good, Archivist?”

His Archivist nods, nonverbal and better for it, eyes cast down to where Elias’ hand works torturously slow. 

“Then you can be good for just a bit longer today.” 

His Archivist doesn’t know what to expect, but it certainly isn’t this. There is no fast, quick, dirty end to their endeavor with his admission. Elias _draws it out._ He wrings his orgasm out of him over time, long, slow strokes that start at the very base and end with extra attention to the head, a pace that demands Jon follow him instead of speeding up. He’s lulled into a calm, endless bliss that makes him melt back against the desk, barely upright by the time it actually starts to creep up at the base of his spine. 

Elias’ hand moves to rub up and down one of his thighs, nearly reverent in its grip. This orgasm is unlike any he’s ever felt before; it starts long before he cums, warm static sending goosebumps up the back of his neck, toes curling around a stream of low and comfortable sighs. There’s no rush, no frustrating on-the-edge-off-the-edge, just a sweet build-up that ends with Elias stroking an orgasm that feels like it spans several minutes out of him. Hot fluid drips over Elias’ knuckles, and Jon swears some of his brain leaves with it, but he’s better for it. Better for what he’s been offered, what he’s earned through his work that’s brought him closer to _answers._

“That’s it.” Elias lifts his clean hand to cradle his Archivist’s face, offering up a smile when he nuzzles into his palm. 

Oh, there will be so much shame down the line. Elias can see it already creeping up into Jon’s face, just at the edges, exhaustion and hazy comfort keeping it at bay. He’ll think about this alone, in his own room, and he’ll question, question, question himself into an ever-deeper hole. 

But one thing he’ll never question, is whether he can stoop that low. He already has. 


End file.
